- Today, I'm gonna show you how to make au gratin potatoes.
It sounds fancy, but it's so easy.
It's also creamy, cheesy, and oh, so delicious.
Check this out.
(gentle upbeat music)
(grunts) Hey, everybody.
It's Natasha of natashaskitchen.com.
Au gratin potatoes.
It sounds fancy,
but it's just basically scalloped potatoes with cheese.
It's really simple to make.
It comes together pretty quickly,
especially if you have the right tools, so stay tuned.
I'm gonna teach you everything you need to know
to make au gratin potatoes. (laughs)
It's fun to say, although I'm probably messing it up.
If you know the right way to pronounce it,
let me know in the comments.
And I am so hungry and craving some potatoes,
so let's get started.
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Let's do this. We'll start with some quick prep.
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Then butter a three quart or 9 by 13-inch casserole.
Once that's generously buttered, set it aside.
Go ahead and grate the cheese so it's ready
when you need it.
You'll need two cups of grated Gruyere cheese.
That's about a six ounce block.
Grate that on the large holes of a box grater
and if you don't have Gruyere,
you can substitute with cheddar cheese.
Now we're gonna make the sauce,
and I like to do this in a Dutch oven
because we need space to stir in potatoes at the end.
Set your Dutch oven or a soup pot over medium heat
and melt in four tablespoons of unsalted butter.
Add a 1/4 cup of flour,
and whisk that together for two minutes until golden.
While whisking constantly, gradually pour in the milk,
followed by the heavy whipping cream.
Now add salt, freshly ground black pepper,
onion powder. and garlic powder.
Continue whisking until your sauce has thickened.
Then remove it from the heat
and stir in 1/2 of your shredded cheese.
Whisk that together until the cheese has melted
and incorporated into the sauce.
This is a good time to taste the sauce
and add more salt and pepper if needed.
Our sauce is ready.
I'm just gonna cover that
and set it aside to keep it warm while I prep the potatoes.
You can peel the potatoes,
or if you prefer to leave the skin on,
use a brush to scrub the outsides of the potatoes.
Now you wanna thinly slice the potatoes,
and there are several ways to do this.
The old fashioned way is just to use a knife,
and I love the santoku knife
because it has the ridges in the blade
that keep the potatoes from sticking to the knife.
Next, you can use a food processor,
and this is actually my favorite way to slice potatoes
because it's super fast and feels a little bit safer.
Adjust your blade to a thin slice
then feed the potato into the hopper.
This will quickly give you uniformly thin sliced potatoes.
You wanna make sure to get those potatoes
to a thickness of 1/8 inch.
Keeping them thinly sliced will ensure even baking.
Now, last but not least, you can use a mandoline slicer
and just set it to 1/8 inch thickness.
I do like to cut off the tip of the potato
and attach it to the food holder
just to keep my fingers safe.
Then, thinly slice your potatoes.
I'll be sure to leave links to all of these kitchen tools
that I use and love.
You can find those in the recipe notes.
To finish these off, I'm going back to my food processor
because it really is my favorite.
It's the quickest
and feels like the safest way to slice these.
I do love that on this model that I'm using,
you can adjust the blade
to adjust the thickness of your slices.
This literally slices up all of your potatoes
in two minutes.
And that is my food processor love story. (laughs)
It is a great gift.
If you don't already have one,
you can put it on your holiday wishlist.
All right, we're ready to use that cream sauce.
I'm gonna give it a quick stir
'cause it's been sitting for a minute.
Now add in all of your potatoes.
Stir the potatoes into the sauce using a spatula.
You just wanna make sure that they're pretty evenly coated.
I like to get sauce between the slices.
That'll ensure every bite is saucy and so delicious.
Transfer your saucy potatoes
into your buttered casserole dish,
and spread them out evenly in the pan.
Once you've flattened out the top,
sprinkle on your remaining one cup of shredded cheese.
Adding cheese on top creates a golden, cheesy crust
that seals in the bubbly juices underneath.
Now, cover the top tightly with foil.
This'll promote even cooking.
And you wanna bake that in the center of a preheated oven
at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 60 minutes.
Next, you'll need to remove the foil
and continue baking for another 15 to 30 minutes
or until the potatoes are tender when pierced with a fork.
For a golden brown crust,
you can also broil for one to two minutes at the end.
Let that rest out of the oven for 15 minutes before serving.
(laughs) Where are my potato fans?
(laughs) Ah, we love potatoes around here,
and we have a lot of potato recipes on our site.
So if you love potatoes (laughs)
this is sure to become a new favorite.
And I'm ready to dig into this.
But before I do,
I do love to add a little bit of chives for garnish,
just because it gives it a little pop of color,
pop of flavor, you know. (laughs)
All right, here we go.
(gentle upbeat music)
All right, it is time to dig in.
And good thing, 'cause I am hungry.
All right, here we go. And to serve, just scoop it out.
So, I've got my big serving fork here.
I like to get around the edges a little bit to loosen it
because it does form a little bit of a cheese crust,
which I love.
All right. Oh, that cheese topping is the best.
I am one of those people
where there's no such thing as too much cheese. (laughs)
Okay, and a nice big portion for me.
And the potatoes are perfectly tender.
If you cut them a little thicker
will take a little longer in the oven
so I like to cut them nice and thin.
Cuts down the baking time.
Okay, let's dig in.
Oh, look at that. Just cuts through like butter.
Okay, here we go. Here we go.
The moment I've been waiting for.
Hmm. (laughs)
(laughs) Okay.
Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm.
Oh, and that Gruyere cheese...
I hope I'm saying that right. Gruyere?
Gruyere. I don't know.
Whatever. It tastes good. (laughs)
It adds so much, like, sophisticated flavor. It's subtle.
It doesn't overpower the dish,
even though there's a whopping two cups
in this casserole, gratin.
I think that means cheese, right?
You know what? This is delicious. (laughs)
I hope it becomes a new favorite recipe for you.
Creamy, cheesy, definitely holiday worthy.
This pairs well with just about any protein.
You can serve it with the holiday turkey, or a prime rib,
or even a beef tenderloin, or chicken.
I'm telling you, it goes well with just about anything,
and it's so simple.
I hope you guys enjoy this.
And we'll see you on the next episode of Natasha's Kitchen.
Now, I'm gonna go eat this.
And let me know if you spotted Sharky in the video.
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